ARRL 10m Contest

I've been anticipating this contest after missing out on CQWW and ARRL DX in October and November. With My new ( old) HF6V vertical and My exsisting wire and smaller vertical antenna, I'd be ready. One week before contest, I checked into local 10m SSB net and HF6V worked and tested well. Then during the week the weather turned very cold and it didn't load as well but does appear to still work-- we will see.
Just before contest start time , the smell of something burning in the basement temporarily sidetracks contesting. After partially resolving that issue , I turn to the radios! The bands are not being kind! Occasional whispers and then nothing! One complete QSO before calling it a night! Worse than last Year. Looking at the Dx-cluster band maps, most activity does not reach up to the far North! Familiar map I see way too often!
Woke up at 4:30AM , back sore and wondered about contest. After powering up the station noticed only activity is in Europe! North America band map empty! Eventually before sunrise the east coast started waking up. On and off all morning and thru the afternoon watched as the band map left out My area and filled east then south and finally west with hardly a green trace up to my area! There was activity in the CW portion but being a SSB kind of guy, left Me out. I did during the day use a CW decode program and it did decode many signals so... need to continue learning code!!
The magic time of zero UTC did give Me another contact and appeared like the floodgates were about to open! East coast coming thru the ether but the opening seems more like a meteor scatter 6m opening with signals fading in and out real fast. Eventually signals did seem to settle down but was not able to get a running frequency going so had to settle for S & P which seemed more painful than normal. I just was not being heard, took way too long for QSO's. It had been a long day so shut it down for the night and hoped for another opening Sunday. I really want to increase last Years score!
Sunday did not have any surprises. Similiar to Saturday with another opening but luckily earlier this time. Did manage to up QSO count but did not surpass last Years totals. Still no luck with a run frequency, so only S & P mode so again very slow log additions.
I still managed to have fun contesting and even finished some inside and out projects and chores so not to impose on the weekend too much. Next Year hope to finally put up the cushcraft ATB34 triband antenna so I'll have some aluminum in the air!
Totals- less than 50 contacts and only about 20 mulipliers for all that work!! I think I'm in the Midwest Blackhole! This Years totals did not beat last Years!! Bummer.